The Royal Mint’s commemorative coin to celebrate the impending marriage of Prince William and Kate Middleton has been released in the U.K. The reviews are in and to call them unkind is an understatement.

The £5 coin ($7.90) is available in either silver or gold and is based on a picture of the royal couple taken — where else? — at a polo match a few years ago. The image, apparently, was signed off by both William and the Queen. Middleton is shown swooning over her young prince, who is presented in profile to allude to “his royal status,” according to Dave Knight, director of commemorative coins at The Royal Mint.

Others haven’t been quite so kind. The general consensus seems to be that Middleton is plump in the face and lips and has bags under her eyes with some critics claiming that William resembles Al Gore (is that bad?).

“This coin is of historical importance, to get it so wrong seems ridiculous,” fumed Ingrid Seward, editor in chief at Majesty Magazine (you should tell us how you really feel, Ingrid). Britain’s Daily Mirror said Middleton looked “far chunkier and older” and William sported “an Elvis Presley quiff.” And in the normally Royal-friendly U.S., readers of the Washington Post voted that the couple looked like Janis Joplin and MTV cartoon character Butthead.

The Royal Mint has confirmed that it had no intention of changing the design, though acknowledged it was difficult to engrave the features of young people onto the small surface area. The only silver (or indeed gold) lining for Middleton is that this is nothing compared to the nastiness that Britain’s tabloids surely have in store for Kate over the forthcoming years. She’d do well to adopt a thick skin sooner rather than later, and that wasn’t a reference to how she appears on the coin. (via AP)